Chapter 29 Appendix II

I keep an eye out for tequila on the supermarket shelves because they often have really cute shapes – caps like big Mexican hats, and cactus-shaped bottles? These are placed prominently Sometimes, it is even placed in Hennessy and my favorite black label Jack Daniel's (it is one of the Jack Daniel's whiskeys I just mentioned, the official name should be "Old No.7 Brand)", because of the old Tennessee-themed song I started to like Tennessee, because of Jack Daniel's I also liked the small town of Lynchburg - many people think that "Old Seven" is a kind of bourbon, which is actually Misunderstanding, it is indeed authentic and traditional Tennessee whiskey) next to it.

Tequila, which we often refer to in general, is actually just a kind of Mezcal (Mezcal) wine, and its name is Tequila, which I mentioned in the preface (although its actual pronunciation is Tequila). Tequila production in Mexico is strictly regulated by official decrees, the purpose of which is to guarantee its high quality so that it can be exported at a better price.The government stipulates that tequila can only be brewed with blue agave or its 26 subspecies (in fact, there are as many as two to three hundred branches of agave, not 136 as reported on the Internet ), the selected material must be disease-free, and the height must be more than half a meter.On average, it takes ten years to harvest a tequila that meets the standard after planting (some varieties only need eight years, but some wineries that cut corners will also use mature time that is not up to standard) ) — compared to grapes, cherries, wheat, sugar cane and other wine crops, such a long waiting time can be said to be unique.

In the traditional method, after the agave is harvested, the heart is washed and baked in a stone oven with a slow fire at 60 to 85 degrees Celsius for 50 to 72 hours - the benefits of the traditional method, It can soften the plant fibers of agave hearts, prevent caramelization caused by rapid heat, and retain and enhance the natural agave flavor. Quite a few large factories use pressure cookers to control the cooking time within eight to fourteen hours. Through the cooking process, the original biological sugars in the heart of the agave are converted into simple sugars that can be mellowed, and then the resulting product is ground (filtered or not filtered according to the different choices of the winery-the traditional method is to grind The residue is also used for fermentation) and used as raw material for fermentation.

At this point people have to choose whether they want to make 100% tequila.If so, filtered agave juice or unfiltered fruit pulp (called "Most" in German) goes into the barrel without any additives; if you want to make "Most", keep at least 5% In the case of eleven agave sugar, other sugars are added, and then fermented. In terms of yeast, some cheap breweries use common brewer's yeast, while old factories such as "Horseshoe Tequila ()" use wild yeast in the air (called Zymomonas Mobilis-this method is not like beer Yeast generally glycolates sugars (often referred to as the "Embden-Meyerhof method"), but in a manner known as the "Entner-Doudoroff method": one unit of NADP+ and one unit of ATP are eventually converted into G3P and Pyruvate) for natural fermentation: Although this method can best preserve the flavor of agave itself, antibiotics must be used because of the need to control the bacteria that may be brought in while waiting for the wild cells. Which of the two methods is better Still hard to judge.

Fermentation tends to take a week or two, depending on the season and temperature—the original sugar is converted to alcohol, and after the yeast dies, we get five to seven percent degrees.Then there is a double distillation (there is also a rare triple distillation-this pursuit of high quality is often thankless), the traditional method uses copper pots, and the modern method uses stainless steel continuous stills-two methods The resulting product is essentially the same: clear, colorless tequila nova. Finally, barrel aging, marking, exporting, and putting on the shelf are strictly divided into the following four grades by the official according to whether it is aged and the length of aging, whether it is Mixto and whether it is dyed:

(Plata) - also labeled as Silver: unaged, undyed, distilled and sold in bottles. ——Also marked as Gold, basically the same as Blanco, the only difference is that it is colored with molasses, oak barrel juice, glycerin or wine caramel: and the weight ratio of the coloring should not exceed 1%. ——Barrel aging for at least two months. ——Barrel aging for more than one year, no upper limit.The volume of oak barrels shall not exceed 600 liters and must be blended with pure water. The price of the most advanced A?ejo, such as the "Seleccion Suprema" from the Horseshoe Factory, is even higher than that of the thirty-year-old Bourbon.

Due to the strict regulations of Mexican officials, every bottle of tequila that leaves the factory is printed with the registration number of the distillery (Normas Oficial Mexicana)-this number varies with different producers: this is also the basis for the birth of this article One of the interesting facts. Finally clearing up a misconception about tequila (it's all from the movie "Born on the Fourth of July") - tequila never had bugs!Dear drinkers, when you drink with a little salt and a slice of lime lime, don't put a worm in the glass anymore-that's a kind of mezcal from elsewhere, and drink it with a worm in the glass: and Not the tequila we usually talk about!